Ken Burns: NYC Subpoena for ‘Central Park Five’ Is ‘Outrageous’

Ken Burns’s documentary “The Central Park Five” has been making waves for the last several months despite the fact that the film has not yet been theatrically released.

In early September lawyers representing New York City subpoenaed the film’s unseen footage.

The documentary, which was screened at the Cannes film festival in May, chronicles the controversial 1989 Central Park Jogger rape case and the subsequent conviction of five black and Latino teenagers. In 2002 all convictions against the five men were thrown out due to new evidence (including DNA) that suggested that a previously convicted murderer-rapist could be the culprit.

City lawyers hope to view and utilize the unused, unreleased documentary footage as supporting evidence in a still pending, multimillion-dollar federal lawsuit case filed in 2003 by the five men for malicious prosecution, racial discrimination and emotional distress.

Burns, who co-directed, wrote and produced the documentary with his daughter, Sarah Burns (author of the book “The Central Park Five: A Chronicle of a City Wilding”) and her husband, David McMahon told The Wall Street Journal that the subpoena is “outrageous.”

“The interviews for this film were conducted in 2008 and 2009,” Burns said. “Why did [New York City lawyers] wait until our film was in the middle of [a festival] release to subpoena us? It just seems so consciously disruptive and needless.”

City officials believe that the unseen footage of the subjects discussing what they deem, coerced confessions, might support their argument that law enforcement and prosecutors were relying on the best information available at the time and acting in good faith.

In a statement given to The Wall Street Journal, Celeste Koeleveld, Executive Assistant Corporation Counsel for Public Safety, New York City Law Department said, “Mr. Burns and his daughter have publicly sided with the plaintiffs and their families, who are seeking hundreds of millions from New York City. Sarah Burns worked for years as a paralegal for the plaintiffs’ lawyers, and Mr. Burns has stated multiple times, before and since the film’s release, that his goal is to ‘put pressure on the City to settle’ and to influence the jury.”

The statement goes on to say “The movie has crossed from documentary to pure advocacy. Under such circumstances, no reasonable person could have expected us to participate in their project. The plaintiffs’ interviews go to the heart of the case and cannot be obtained elsewhere. If the plaintiffs truly want an open airing of the facts, they should encourage the filmmakers not to hide anything.”

Burns maintains that he “regularly” made interview requests with police and prosecutors involved with the case throughout the film’s production.

“If their reason or excuse for not participating in the film is because they already assumed that it was bias, why did I repeatedly ask them to tell their stories?” Burns asked. “I think it’s because they don’t have answers for half the questions I have for them.”

He added that he takes offense to Koeleveld’s claims that he and his co-directors aligned themselves with the plaintiffs.

“If you go back and look at all of the films I’ve made in my 35 year career, this is the least subjective one. We just gave the facts. It’s as straight a film as possibly could have been done.”

While the director says that his daughter did work for a law firm associated with the plaintiffs, she, according to Burns, “never worked on that specific case.” He added, “Her research for the book was completely independent of her work at the firm.”

As for claims that he wants to put pressure on the city to settle, Burns said that he approached city officials about the plaintiff’s lawsuit due to the lengthy amount of time it has taken to settle the case.

Burns is hoping that New York State’s shield laws, which are designed to protect journalists from having to compromise their sources, will prevent him and his co-directors from releasing any of their footage.

“We are journalists,” Burns says. “We are allowed to investigate and discover things.”

On October 2 the city’s law department sent an amended subpoena narrowing the material requested to “key participants only.” If Burns and his co-directors refuse to release footage, city officials said on October 24, that they “can move to compel compliance in court.”

Burns said that he and his team will continue to fight the subpoena “vigorously.” Meanwhile, “The Central Park Five” will hit New York City theaters on November 23.

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